Strange Quote, Strange Source

In the latest issue of Good Magazine there’s an article about Christie Hefner, chairman and CEO of Playboy Enterprises and daughter of Hugh. The piece is interesting for a variety of reasons, primarily because it explores Playboy’s lesser known activist side, revealing some surprising details: Playboy runs something called the Hugh M. Hefner First Amendment Awards, whose winners have included filmmaker Michael Moore, comedian Bill Maher and a high school student who successfully defended her right to form a gay/straight alliance at her Texas school. Other little known facts about the corporation that are revealed incude them filing an amicus brief in Roe v. Wade, and coming out strongly in favor of gay marriage. All very suprising, considering when we think Playboy (or porn in general,) we seem to generally jump right to “sexist,” or “exploitive.”

The “can porn be feminist?” question is not a new one, but the reason I bring up this article and Christie Hefner (who adamantly refers to herself as both a feminist and an activist) is because of a single (very controversial) quote in the article that rattled me more than a little bit, and that is relevent considering our recent discussion on what it means to call yourself a feminist:

“To say you’re not a feminist is virtually the same thing as saying you’re a racist.”